YMMV / DC Super Hero Girls (2019)

• Adorkable: Each one of them is this in their own way.
  • Diana is very prone to displaying this type of behavior, typically when she's discovering "World of Man" customs but especially when Steve Trevor is around.
  • Babs fills this trope as a spunky, energetic fangirl of pretty much anything heroic with Batman being her main fixation.
  • Kara is tough as nails, but can't help but gush over cute animals. It's actually quite endearing.
  • Jess is normally this in other media due to being more introverted and insecure of herself. She's still this here thanks to her girl scout-like idealism and willingness to see the best in others.
  • Karen's a scientific genius who's rather low on confidence, making her cute as a button.
  • Zee isn't this so much in the present day, but as a child, she was such a cutie thanks to her love of her father, and trying to hide her insecurities.
  • Barry is just an energetic ball of dorkiness considering his love of playgrounds, selfies, and working at an ice cream parlor.
• Anvilicious: For some people, the emphasis on female empowerment can be a bit too on-the-nose, especially since many beloved male superheroes were given the Adaptational Jerkass or Adaptational Wimp treatment to make the girls look better by comparison, which undermines the entire message.
• Ass Pull: #FightAtTheMuseum has a couple.
  • The reveal that Catwoman planned for Supergirl to show up alone, because Supergirl is known for fighting with a team and is far from being the only hero in town. It makes no sense how Catwoman could know that Supergirl and only Supergirl would confront her at the museum, and since Catwoman couldn't have possibly been aware of the reasons why Kara didn't call for backup, makes it look like a Contrived Coincidence at best.
  • The fact Kara doesn't know what Kryptonite is until this episode makes no sense and is given no explanation either. The fact it was on display at a museum and Catwoman both knew what it was and its effects on Kryptonians show that Kryptonite is public knowledge- and it being one of the few substances on Earth that can hurt her, there's honestly no reason Kara shouldn't know what it is.
• Awesome Music:
  • “#LeagueOfShadows” has two:
    • "You're Mine", Ra's Al Ghul's Compelling Voice Villain Song that he uses to control Supergirl through her Red Kryptonite necklace.
    • "Let Me Save You With My Love", sung by Hal, Barry, and Garth posing as Bumblebee’s favorite boy band, Up Past 8, as the Superhero Girls try to snap Supergirl out of her brainwashing.
• Base-Breaking Character:
  • Carol Ferris is either liked and people feel bad for her situation with Hal. Others think she's annoying and don't blame Hal for dumping her (some even miss when she was a hero in the previous iteration).
  • Jessica Cruz is either liked for being something new to include in animated DC adaptations, people genuinely agreeing with her sentiments and her attractive appearance or think she's the worst character for being so Anvilicious that it comes off as forceful as well as how she treats Hal.
  • Fans either like Supergirl because they sympathize with her struggles in getting out of her cousin Superman's shadow or despise her for being a brash and unapologetic idiot who rarely owns up to her less sympathetic actions and constantly whines about her hatred of things like "nerd stuff".
• Broken Base: The changing back to villains of characters like Harley Quinn, Poison Ivy and Star Sapphire. Some people love that they changed them back. Others (preferably newer fans of the DC Universe) were perfectly fine with them being heroes and/or anti-heroes (their current iterations being just those doesn't help). This is the worst for Star Sapphire considering her more drastic and base-breaking changes in contrast (some people actually prefer her more heroic webseries counterpart for this reason). The only one who hasn't seemed to suffer this is Catwoman (granted she's the only one that's held the anti-heroine title longer than Harley and Ivy).
• Complete Monster: "#NightmareInGotham": The Joker is a teenaged supervillain and Batman's Arch-Enemy. Desiring to give Gotham its scariest Halloween, Joker breaks out of Arkham Reform School, killing one of the guards in the process, and manipulates the Super Hero Girls into releasing 3 dangerous villains, before luring them to Gotham to have them cause massive destruction and mayhem throughout the city, endangering many innocent lives in the process. Fearing that someone will outdo his efforts in the future, Joker attempts to destroy all of Gotham with a bomb, killing everyone in it, just so that no one can ever one up him.
• Ensemble Dark Horse: Zatara is well-loved by many fans for being a rare wise, helpful adult aiding the main cast, having a sweet relationship with his daughter complete with many heartwarming moments, acts as one of the more positive male heroes in the series, and just being an all-around badass in general.
• Fandom Rivalry
  • With the previous Shea Fontana series. Those who prefer the Lauren Faust series think it has stronger characterization, and praise its more zany energy and cartoon violence, thinking the former plays things too safely. Those who prefer the Shea Fontana series like its more positive vibe, as well as some of its changes like Ivy and Harley being heroines, and aren't fond with how most of the male characters in this series are written.
  • There's what one could call a friendly rivalry with Teen Titans Go!, partly due to the two using much of the same subject matter but being very different approaches to parody, mostly due to the fact Teen Titans Go was a Long Runner Adored by the Network while DC Super Hero Girls was a brief Screwed by the Network show. Those who just got tired of Teen Titans Go after so many years, didn't like something about it to begin with or just plain disliked it because of how prominent it was were annoyed a show that was simply different or liked for some other merit got thrown under the bus, canceled and then removed from all legal digital channels while the deeply entrenched mainstay chugged along with no end in sight. This rivalry still is a lot less fierce than what Teen Titans Go has with other DC properties simply because Teen Titans Go wasn't AS adored by the network as it had been prior to DC Super Hero Girls' run, DC Super Hero Girls gets some of the same hate Teen Titans Go does simply for being a parody even though it's a significantly more reverent one to DC Comics, DC Super Hero Girls was strongly supported by about every relevant wing of the Warner Brothers empire except Cartoon Network itself and DC Superhero Girls had three crossovers with Teen Titans Go with the latter being a Spotlight-Stealing Crossover in DC Super Hero Girls' favor. It was less about hating the other show and more so wanting Cartoon Network to treat this one as well as the other.
• Fan-Preferred Couple
  • Diana/Tatsu exploded in popularity after "#SoulSisters" thanks to how quickly they became close friends and the chemistry they share.
  • On the hetero side (as of Season 1), we have Batgirl/Flash.
• Friendly Fandoms:
  • Fans of My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic generally consider this show to be a Spiritual Successor of some sorts. Both were made by Lauren Faust, and star a core ensemble of six characters who are reinterpretations of recognizable female characters from a long-running franchise. The central protagonist of both is even an Adorkable, purple character voiced by Tara Strong.
  • Fans of Super Best Friends Forever are usually fond of the show for being a SBFF series in-all-but-name.
  • When the above mentioned rivalry isn't at play, there are fans of the Shea Fontana DC SuperHero Girls series that do appreciate the new take that this show brings.
  • The show gets compared a lot to The Powerpuff Girls (1998) due to its all-girl ensemble and similar tone; the show's creator worked on the original version.
  • Teen Titans (2003) fans are drawn to the series because of its similar premise: a comedy/action cartoon featuring teenage DC characters.
  • Fans of Teen Titans Go and DC Super Hero Girls' are generally friendly rivals. Most DC Super Hero Girls fans tolerate the existence of Teen Titans Go and just wish Cartoon Network treated DC Super Hero Girls as well as Teen Titans Go. It helps that the most vocal fans, at least early on, tended to be Super Best Friends Forever fans who had wanted Cartoon Network to pick that up, were happy to have finally gotten something resembling it, and were disappointed that the show they had waited four years for wasn't supported more strongly. The three Teen Titans Go crossovers were considered a consolation prize that at least afforded fans a little more material to enjoy.
• Genius Bonus:
  • Diana's spell to summon a sleep-inducing flower in "#AwesomeAuntAntiope" invokes Hypnos. Hypnos is the Greek God of sleep, and the poppy is his emblem.
  • The incantation to free captured souls from the Soultaker sword is made of the eight virtues of Bushido.
  • The main antagonist of "#LivingTheNightmare" is Fuseli, the Lord of Night Terrors. In real life, there is a painting called "The Nightmare", painted by Henry Fuseli.
• Germans Love David Hasselhoff: Compared to the minimal advertisement it gets on the U.S. Cartoon Network, it gets a lot of promotion on the Latin American feed. It helps that superheroes are very popular there in general.
• Hilarious in Hindsight: Jessica Cruz was co-created by Ethan Van Sciver, who is (or was) seen as one of the most vocally "right wing" comic book creators working in the business, right down to bashing vegans/vegetarians and pacifists, both of which Jessica is in this show. He's also very publicly denounced the modern feminist movement, and this is a show highlighting female characters.
• Magnificent Bastard:
  • Catwoman manages to be even more intelligent than her comic counterpart. After studying the Super Hero Girls and how to exploit their weakness, she robs a store banking on the fact that Supergirl would show up and prepares Kryptonite to use against her. Though stopped, she gets away and comes up with an idea to form a team to take the girls down: forming her team acting as the Only Sane Woman to the group, leading them in a crime spree before being stopped by the girls. Although the Super Hero Girls blackmail her into helping them steal the Book of Infinity from Lex Luthor, it turns out to have all been a trap, with Catwoman working with Luthor the entire time. However, once Catwoman learns of Luthor's plan to have a meteor hit the Earth so he can rule over whatever is left, she turns on him. After freeing the girls and tearing a page out from the book so Lex can't see it coming, she steals all of his stuff as one last slap to him.
  • "#LeagueOfShadows": Ra's Al-Ghul is once again as intelligent and charming as ever. Starting a band called the League of Shadows in a place called the Lazarus Pit, Ra's plans to purify the world for them to rule over. He discovers one of his biggest fans Kara Danvers is the superheroine Supergirl as well that her weakness is Kryptonite, so he gets his hands on some Red Kryptonite. Using this knowledge, when Kara comes to his latest concert, Ra's brings her into his room and uses his charisma to manipulate her and gives her a choker that contains the Red Kryptonite. The Red Kryptonite starts to take over Kara, and Ra's uses a mind control song to brainwash her, putting her completely under his control. He has her steal two tickets to a boy band concert Up Past Eight for his first act to purify the world by eliminating bad music.
• Moe:
  • Bumblebee stands out from the team for being incredibly adorable and sweet.
  • Batgirl is definitely this, especially as a child.
  • Flash qualifies whenever he's in costume◊. His outfit working at Sweet Justice makes him look so sweet with a pink apron on!
  • Aqualad has many fans think him as adorable, especially since his design has many fans think of Steven Universe, or even Spike.
  • Wonder Woman is this in her more Adorkable moments.
• Shocking Moments:
  • "#HappyBirthdayZee": The episode dealing with Zee's mother abandoning her on her birthday when she was a child. It does not shy away from showing how much of an effect it had on Zee, being what caused her to get such high standards towards all of her birthdays. The show is light-hearted, so to see it dealing with a subject like this was not expected.
  • "#WarriorAndTheJester": When Wonder Woman finds out that Harleen Quinzel is the supervillain Harley Quinn but is forced to keep silent due to owing her a big favour. The show normally thrives on Status Quo Is God, so having a discovery that shakes things up this dramatically was not something that many fans expected.
  • "#NightmareInGotham": Barbara ends up learning Harleen is Harley Quinn, and we meet this show's version of the Joker, who raises the stakes into Darker and Edgier territory by trying to kill everyone in Gotham City.
• Signature Scene: It's a tossup between the food fight that establishes 5/6ths of the budding team's personalities and the detention fight that establishes 5/6ths of The Super Hero Girls' abilities. Together they really hammer home that this is a silly fantastical high school show first and super heroic adventure show second. Which scene leaves more of an impression usually determines which aspect the observer cares more about.
• They Changed It, Now It Sucks!:
  • The most common complaint towards the series is that it is In Name Only to the 2015 series (to say nothing of the original comic books). There's no Super Hero School. Instead, it's a more standard High School AU starring various DC characters as teenagers.
  • The age lifted effect has also seems to have spread to all but Batman and Commissioner Gordon. Superman is only a few years older than the high-school-er characters, and characters associated with him like Lois Lane and Lex Luthor are now teens.
  • In general, many fans feel this way about the male superheroes since many suffer Adaptational Jerkass or Adaptational Wimp compared to their female counterparts and in addition to that many are In Name Only adaptations that follow no previous characterizations the characters have ever had, a good example being Dick Grayson who in the show is a one-dimensional Jerkass who has really no resemblance to any version of the character, and is more of an amalgam of Jason Todd and Damian Wayne's negative traits.
  • The divide over Kara Zor-El and Jessica Cruz stems from those who find the drastic changes to their characters funny, and those who just don't think the jokes were worth it.
• They Wasted a Perfectly Good Character:
  • Like the previous series, Wonder Woman is once again made the lead over Wonder Girl despite the latter being more suited for the role as the Fish out of Water main character among a cast of teenagers, not helped by the fact the series is very blatantly a reworked version of the Super Best Friends Forever shorts which did feature Wonder Girl with the exact same personality and even voice actress Wonder Woman has here.
  • Similarly, Hal Jordan and Barry Allen being agelifted instead of using their younger counterparts, Simon Baz and Wally West.
  • Casey Krinsky never appeared in the show after her debut episode, despite being vengeful and self-loathing. She could’ve had a compelling redemption arc and formed a genuine friendship with Zee. It also would’ve been a great opportunity to teach kids that self-love is more important than being popular.
• Unintentional Period Piece: The Twitter "trending" episode titles in general, the Nintendo Switch being played during #ToughCrowd in particular and the eponymous lady of #AllAboutZee wearing Camilla Gabrieli brand shoes, which launched at roughly the same time as the show itself, do much to date it.
• Unintentional Uncanny Valley: Wee, the babyface Zatanna clone from "#MultipliciZee" was meant to be cute, but had the opposite effect. The adorable clone has an unnerving shrunken-in infant face on the body of a teenager, which looks about as unnatural as one might expect.
• Unexpected Character:
  • Casey Krinsky is a very, very obscure Firestorm villain. It's safe to say that no one assumed she'd appear at all.
  • The She-Bat (Francine Langston) has only ever appeared once in animation and one Elseworld comic.

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